EAVIS FACES PROSECUTION OVER GLASTO NUMBERS

The local authority take him to task over the number of people who got in to this year's event...

GLASTONBURY FESTIVAL organiser MICHAEL EAVIS is facing prosecution over the number of people who got into this year’s bash.

Local authority Mendip District Council voted to prosecute him for breach of licence after a three-hour meeting last night (October 12), which was attended by local police and Eavis.

The BBC News website reports that Police Superintendent John Buckley said the issues raised over the alleged 100,000 fence jumpers at Glastonbury 2000 are “extremely serious”. While saying police didn’t want to see the festival stopped, he continued: “Large public events have suffered tragedies and the priority for all of us must be public safety.”

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Eavis is quoted as saying “I am being the victim of other events. There has been Roskilde, Notting Hill and Hillsborough and they think we’re going to be next. It?s rubbish. We didn’t get one single person hurt as a result of crushing or overcrowding this year.”

In August, nme.com reported on the possibility of prosecution after a report by a group of Glastonbury councillors led by Jim Mochnacz said the “viability of the festival may be seriously undermined” if nothing is done to prevent the stream of non-ticket holding festival-goers coming into the festival.

The report refers to Roskilde, where nine people were crushed to death, the report states: “Prosecution of festival organisers should be considered this year for serious and ongoing lapses in perimeter fence security and failure to control significant numbers.”

In an attempt to combat the number of people getting in to the festival without paying, last month, Eavis unveiled an “invincible” 20 ft superfence, at a cost of #1 million. “We now have to tell everyone that you can’t get in without a ticket,” Eavis told nme.com. “The old fence had become something of a joke. Part of growing up was to get over the Glastonbury fence.”

nme.com attempted to contact Michael Eavis for confirmation and comment, but he was unavailable.

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